Loyal/Hardcore Raptors fans?

[The Great One]

I've been a hardcore Raps fan since the VC/T-Mac era. I was a Rockets fan growing up(still follow them to this day) but really fell in love with the Raps specially with VC back in the late 90's/early 2000's.

This team right now though is tough watch. Too many losing seasons is not fun. I still would follow the team, i think they have a good young player/future allstar in JV. But other than him i don't have much positive to say about the team.

The management is a mess. Hated the Bargnani pick back in 2006. It's too risky to draft a big European player 1st overall. Colangelo said he's going to upgrade the SF position at the end of last season. Is Landry Fields really an upgrade over James Johnson? really?

The coaching staff seems confused. Casey looks like he has no idea what he's doing. His substitution patterns to start the season was puzzling, the way he has handled Bargnani and Davis' minutes is ridiculous. The offence is as bad as i've seen. Very predictable, lots of one on one. No ball movement. The defence is ridiculously bad. Casey is supposed to be a defensive coach right?

Raps need to do something BIG to make me interested again.

[psrs1]

I've been a hardcore Raps fan since the VC/T-Mac era. I was a Rockets fan growing up(still follow them to this day) but really fell in love with the Raps specially with VC back in the late 90's/early 2000's.

This team right now though is tough watch. Too many losing seasons is not fun. I still would follow the team, i think they have a good young player/future allstar in JV. But other than him i don't have much positive to say about the team.

The management is a mess. Hated the Bargnani pick back in 2006. It's too risky to draft a big European player 1st overall. Colangelo said he's going to upgrade the SF position at the end of last season. Is Landry Fields really an upgrade over James Johnson? really?

The coaching staff seems confused. Casey looks like he has no idea what he's doing. His substitution patterns to start the season was puzzling, the way he has handled Bargnani and Davis' minutes is ridiculous. The offence is as bad as i've seen. Very predictable, lots of one on one. No ball movement. The defence is ridiculously bad. Casey is supposed to be a defensive coach right?

Raps need to do something BIG to make me interested again.

Fire Casey hire SVG? Big enough?

[japetas]

Fire Casey hire SVG? Big enough?

+1

[wallz]

Fire Casey hire SVG? Big enough?

As crazy as that sounds.. I would love it

[The Great One]

As crazy as that sounds.. I would love it

If Casey gets fired and if they were to hire a Van Gundy. I prefer Jeff to be honest.

[robert parrish 00]

SVG would be great. I even think he would consider inheriting this mess just so he can yell at a new crop of underacheivers.

[d749]

and svg would probably try to make them play great d and keep the scoring under 100 so he wouldnt have to deal with the embarassment of free pizza slices.

[stretch]

Win or lose, I watch Raptors games whenever possible. It's a force of habit. For my mental health, I watch NCAA hoops also.

[knowledgep]

Sorry, but i'm here for bad or good, since '96 and won't stop. This won't be as bad as the 97-98 season. over under 16 wins?

[minks77]

After watching the 66 last year I was full of hope because of Casey and I cannot bring myself to believe that this is his fault. This team looks NOTHING like the team I was so pleased with (losses aside) last year. I want to believe someone has gotten in his ear and pushed him to play this bullshit run n gun constant push style. That person, if he exists, needs to be fired.

[Soft Euro]

After watching the 66 last year I was full of hope because of Casey and I cannot bring myself to believe that this is his fault. This team looks NOTHING like the team I was so pleased with (losses aside) last year. I want to believe someone has gotten in his ear and pushed him to play this bullshit run n gun constant push style. That person, if he exists, needs to be fired.

In a pre-season interview I heard him say he wanted the next step (after improving the defense last year) to be to start pushing the tempo more on offense and that he hoped this wouldn't hurt the defense too much. I don't remember if this was the same interview, but he has also said that he wanted to be the offense to be "random" in order not to be predictable. That was pretty mindblowing and we have seen so far what random offense leads to and it's not exactly unpredictable.

[BasketballCrush]

With our roster, you are bound to have an off quarter, young inexperienced, pg is a new addition and is feeling out what others can do in the game.


I give the team all the credit in the world for keeping up with some good opponents, but they are just not talented enough to put away teams and beat the truly good players when it counts.

(I don't see how you can blame the coach for this and at the same time not give credit when the team has held its own for entire games against tough opponents)

[Axel]

Hardcore to the bitterest of ends.

The team has lots of holes, but there was a lot of optimism going into the season, and not all of it was hot air.

Bargnani "the 13" was hoped to return, healthy and inspired.
Lowry was an upgrade at the point and would defend.
Fields was the perfect complimentary player who could do the little things that helps teams win (even if overpaid, we were hopefuly).
2 lottery picks joining the team. JV and Ross were part of the future.
Demar in his contract year.
Jose's expiring deal for a trade chip.
A top 10 defence was the goal.

Obviously things haven't quite panned out.

Barg's is playing worse than anyone feared.
Lowry got hot, then hurt, and now is somewhere in between.
Fields was awful and then hurt. Or hopefully he was hurt and we didn't know it, hence why he was awful. So small optimism left.
JV has been better than expected for such a young player. Ross has shown improvement in his short career and looks legit.
Demar got his deal and improved as a player. He is smarter and committed to this franchise. I was never high on Demar, but am liking the changes to his game.
Jose's deal is still to come.
Top 10 defence is just a label. The team needs to start playing defence at all, then work it's way up to a high level of defensive efficiency.

Bonus:
Ed Davis has, at times, looked much better than last year.
The team recognizes how bad it is. Player meetings, GM under fire, #tradeBargs; these are all signs that the complatency that has dogged this franchise may be over.

Like I said, to the bitterest of ends.

[slaw]

Sorry, but i'm here for bad or good, since '96 and won't stop. This won't be as bad as the 97-98 season. over under 16 wins?

As bad as it is now, that '97 team was unwatchable. They may not hold all-time bad record status but that was the worst basketball team I have ever seen in my time watching the NBA.

Still, I will say that I haven't seen Raps fans this angry since the Carter trade. I would say that fan anger was worse then than now but it's getting close....

EDIT: As for me, I was a season ticket holder when I lived in Toronto from 2000-2004. After I moved, I continued to buy tickets to 10 games or so a year and gave them away to clients and always travelled to Toronto to watch a couple with my dad. After the 2009-2010 season, I stopped buying tickets. The 2010-11 season was the first year my dad and I did not travel to Toronto for a game. Last year, we missed again and we have no plans this season. My guess is that while the hardcore fans will follow the team regardless, a lot of us are spending less money supporting the team.